Hello Insiders, this week we're doing a little bit
of a deep dive into a specific topic.
Let's call this one a sneak peek into the Studio Beta.
I actually spent the last several days going through
a lot of the feedback in the submit feedback link
in the Studio Beta itself,
and then also was following some conversations
on Twitter about the Studio Beta.
And I thought it would be helpful on the Insider Channel
to provide a little bit more context around some
of the common questions that that we're hearing
about the new Studio.
So the first one, which is understandable is,
Why are you doing this?
Classic was working fine.
Why are you forcing me to go this new thing?
The reason is that at the end of the day,
we want to provide as innovative
and effective tools as we can to creators
and Classic has become really hard to work on,
from a technical point of view.
It's probably close to 10 years old.
So if you think about it, it might be like
that 10-year old laptop that kind of works,
but you don't want to add anything to it
because it's a little unstable
or it's harder to make improvements to it.
So Studio Beta is obviously built
on brand new technology that allows us
to maintain it a lot more easily and just as importantly,
perhaps even more importantly,
add new features over the next few years
much more quickly and in a way
that might not have been possible
had we kept keeping Classic limping along.
But for sure, this is gonna be the hardest point
of that transition.
It's a little bit like if we stick with that laptop analogy,
like moving from one laptop to a newer one,
even though the newer one, in the long run
will be better, it does let's say,
take some time to get used to it.
Kind of a little bit of the back story
on why we're moving from Classic to Studio Beta.
The other common thing is,
Okay I get you need to do that,
Why don't you wait till the new Studio is perfect,
and then move us all over at that point?
Short answer is that there is a hidden cost
to having both platforms operating simultaneously.
And there's really just no way around
that kind of difficult transition.
You just have to make that leap.
And now that we feel like okay, we have
all the core journeys well supported in Studio,
we've gotten over a year of feedback,
we've been making improvements every month.
We think the time to move everybody over is coming.
And right now, actually, most YouTube creators
are on Studio Beta by default.
And so it's just a question of when do we get everybody
onto the new platform.
Another common question we've heard is
hey, but Studio Beta is missing,
it's missing crucial things, like it's missing End Screens,
or I can't add a video to a playlist,
or you know, I can't trim my video.
You know, analytics it doesn't have the ability
to see a real time data.
Those are all complaints that we
heard very early on and acted on it.
So as of today, when we're shooting this,
you can add an End Screen in the Studio Beta.
You can add a video to a playlist in the Studio Beta.
You can see real time data in the Studio Beta.
I think with that, maybe there might be some real time
that's still coming over, but it's close to parity.
You can also edit your custom thumbnails
in the Studio Beta.
Like all of these things were missing in the very,
very early days of Studio Beta, but as I said,
we've been adding features every month.
So now that list of things that aren't in the Studio Beta
is getting much, much smaller.
I would say even then, when we know
that something isn't there, for example, the ability
to add captions you can do from the Studio Beta.
You basically select the video, select transcriptions,
and then click Add Captions.
It then opens up a view of the Caption Editor
from Classic, but it does it in a way that doesn't
make it feel like you have to leave Studio Beta.
It's kind of contained.
So even when we don't have something
natively in Studio Beta, it's always within arm's reach.
Much better to get to know Studio Beta
now, as your default.
If you need to, from time to time,
go to Classic, but really try and
use Studio Beta as much as you can.
The next thing I've heard from creators like you
is, I know that there is stuff in the Studio Beta,
but it's hard to find.
And I've heard this a lot,
and I think the key thing there is understanding
that the navigation model for Studio Beta
is different than Classic.
So for Classic, it's all about features first
and you go find the feature like if you want to do
something with End Screens,
just go to the End Screen Editor.
If you want to do captions, there's a captions option.
The problem with that is that if you want to do,
let's say both of those things to the same video,
the Classic model makes you jump back and forth a lot,
whereas for the Studio Beta model,
you first pick the video you want to modify,
and then all of the things you can do for that video
are then available on that left hand menu.
And they're basically pre-deep-linked into that video.
Now, if you didn't know that and you're like,
Hey, I want to add an End Screen,
and you go to Studio Beta for the first time,
you look at the left hand side, you're not going
to see entries because you're at the channel level,
you haven't yet selected a video.
You're already seeing a growing list of exclusive
Studio Beta features with the Studio Beta snapshot card
which I love love love, not available in Classic.
Ability to see your click through rates,
for your thumbnails, already in Studio Beta,
will never be coming too Classic.
Ability to see known issues, news
and Creator Insider on your dashboard,
all of that is in Studio Beta.
A lot of that is not in Classic
and will not be coming to Classic.
So I think those are the key points I wanted
to get across for the Studio Beta.
One other thing that I have heard people ask is like,
whoa, when is this happening?
Are you just gonna kill Classic instantly?
No, we're not going to kill Classic instantly.
I think our position is we want to get the Studio Beta
to a place where we feel like it's appropriate
to start removing access to Classic
and then eventually deprecating it entirely.
We're starting to move more and more
in the next few months, I imagine we'll move almost
all creators in terms to the Studio Beta as their default.
You'll still be able to go to Classic
through these embedded links
or the general access point to Classic
in the bottom left hand corner.
At some point, that bottom left hand corner,
escape hatch, if you will, will go away as well.
Because, eventually Classic needs to go away
because the longer we keep Classic on,
the slower it takes us to develop
new things for creators.
I know we kind of already went over that,
but it really is an important point.
You kind of have to take that leap and hopefully,
with your feedback and support
and also with the track record you've seen.
For those of you who tried Studio Beta in early 2018,
and you try it now, I think you'll see huge strides.
And at that current trajectory, by the end of '19,
I think you'll be delighted.
But we gotta move people over
and with your partnership, we can do that in a way
that helps your channel grow faster,
and reflects the input that you've given us.
So thanks everybody for using that send feedback link
in the Studio Beta, for commenting
on Creator Insider videos and for providing
us feedback in those manners
because we do look at them on a very regular basis.
Probably every few weeks we'll review
what the top complaints are,
what the top suggestions are,
and we do actually tweak our plans
and our priorities to kind of reflect that.
So thanks again, hope this was helpful and keep it real.